


Garden of Eden

by clxude



Series: of Sinners and Saints [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Angst, Hallucinations, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, angel!kuroo, brief descriptions of gore, ghost touches, god!kiyoko, if that's a thing, if you can do that when you're dead, kenma dies but he's not gone, maybe? - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2016-10-17
Packaged: 2018-08-22 21:31:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8301854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clxude/pseuds/clxude
Summary: There's a knock at the door. It isn't Kuroo.seraphim spin-off/conclusion





	

**Author's Note:**

> shit hits the fan, kenma suffers, Kiyoko isn't the most helpful of gods, but Kuroo is coming home  
> beta-ed by sarcasticspacenerd on tumblr. thanks for sticking around rey <3

_ “Who are you?” _

 

_ He doesn’t respond. It will just distract him, and he’s so close. A few more hits, and he’ll kill the boss. He’s been trying to beat this game nonstop for weeks; he’s not about to give up now, at the closest he’s ever been.  _

 

_ “I’m Kuroo  _ _ Tetsurou. You can call me Kuroo or Tetsurou, it doesn’t matter.” _

 

_ Kenma’s close - one hit, if he can’t dodge the boss’ next blow -  _

 

_ “Do you not like to talk?” _

 

_ He’s too slow: the boss kills him with one decisive strike. Kenma sighs, and drops the handheld into his lap. He looks at Kuroo Tetsurou for the first time, takes in his messy hair and his smile-crinkled eyes.  _

 

_ “That’s okay. My friends all say I talk enough for two people.” _

 

_ “Kozume… Kozume Kenma.” _

 

_ “Hmm?” Kuroo raises an eyebrow. _

 

_ “My name is Kozume Kenma,” he says again, slightly louder this time. _

 

_ “Hello, Kozume-kun. Do you want to be friends?” _

 

_ Kenma doesn’t bother with answering, and goes back to his game. Kuroo hums happily and watches him play over the blonde’s shoulder. _

 

_ “Do you like video games, Kozume-kun?” _

 

_ Kenma shrugs. _

 

_ “I’ve never played any before, but they look fun.” _

 

_ It’s a bit surprising to meet someone who’s never played a video game before. Kenma guesses that’s why Kuroo Tetsurou doesn’t know to shut up. _

 

_ “You look pretty good at it, though, Kozume-kun.”  _

 

_ A few seconds pass, and finally - “I could watch you play all day, Kozume Kenma.” _

 

...

 

Kenma is playing an old pokemon game when someone knocks on his door. He doesn’t get up - the only person who ever comes over is Kuroo, and Kenma had a key made for him a few months back. He fiddles with his stylus, tapping it against the screen.

 

He hears another knock. 

 

“Kuroo?” he calls. His throat is sore - he hasn’t talked much in the last few days since Kuroo hasn’t come over. He said hello to his neighbor yesterday, he thinks, but he’s not certain. 

 

He hears the door knob click, the door swinging open. 

 

“Is that you?”

 

He’s not sure why he asks that. It has to be Kuroo, no one else has a key.

 

Kuroo still hasn’t responded, so Kenma sets his DS down carefully on his pillow, slides out from under his blankets, and pads out of his room and into the hallway. He pulls his hoodie sleeves over his fingers, rolls his tense shoulders. 

 

He sticks his head into the living room. “Kuroo?”

 

It’s not Kuroo.

 

…

 

He wakes up in Gamestop, unsettled and agitated. He’s not sure how he ended up here, or why the light that’s been flickering for as long as Kenma has been coming here is no longer doing so. The carpet is a shade off, but it could just be the lighting. Even the cashier is unfamiliar. 

 

There’s a new  _ Halo  _ game on the shelves, but Kenma has no memory of it ever being announced, or Hinata ever mentioning it during one of their study sessions. He steps closer to study the cover and can find no secondary title, or even a price tag. The only thing besides the infamous  _ Halo  _ title is a picture of a girl, dressed in green air assault armor, an  MA37 is held in one hand, her helmet tucked under her other arm. 

 

He looks up at the cashier girl, at her silky black hair, her thin glasses. Their eyes connect, and he immediately goes back to looking at  _ Halo. _ He was right; it’s the same girl.

 

“Where am I?” 

 

“Where do you want to be?” she asks instead of answering.

 

“With Kuroo,” he whispers.

 

“I’m afraid that’s not an option anymore, Kozume Kenma.”

 

He blinks, and finds himself somewhere completely different, where the skies are cloud-spotted, eggshell blue, and the grass emerald green. The sun is setting - he watches it sink down below the horizon. And yet, the sky never changes hue, never loses its blue tones. 

 

And suddenly, the clouds are all falling, coming down to kiss the earth like dying birds, exploding against the grass like grenades. He feels a pinching sensation in his stomach. He presses his right hand against it, and when he pulls away, his palm is covered in blood. His shirt is spotless. There is no sign of the clouds on the ground, but the sky is full of fluffy white masses.

 

And, like a light switch being thrown, like the curtains going down at the end of a play, the sky goes dark.

 

…

 

The next day - or maybe it’s not the next day, maybe days don’t exist wherever he is now - he feels like he’s dying as the sun rises. 

 

It’s like the B-rated horror films the local station plays at three am to film air time, when some blonde girl will be sacrificed to Satan - except, he’s all alone, and there’s no blood in sight. He convulses on the grass, his backing arching so sharply he feels like it is going to snap in two. 

 

The grass feels like styrofoam, compressing beneath his weight.

 

He blinks, and once again, the world is dark.

 

…

 

He has no idea how much has time has passed by the time he can see again, or if any time has passed at all. The grass no longer feels like styrofoam, sharper now, more solid with less give. The sky has taken on a yellow hue, like a lemon, or a traffic light. 

 

He blinks, and when he looks back up at the sky, the clouds are red, the sun is blue, and the sky is lavender.

 

It’s all a dream, he’s dead, nothing’s real.

 

None of it was ever real.

 

...

 

He wakes up with a woman’s hands on his face. It’s the woman from Gamestop, but she looks older now, her eyes harsher. Her hands are soft, although they feel more like a summer’s breeze than flesh and blood. 

 

Once Kenma’s eyes are open and he has blinked away sleep, she pulls away, and where her hands once were now feels like a wasteland; dry, forgotten. 

 

_ Do you know where you are? _

 

Her mouth never opens, her lips never so much as quiver, but Kenma still hears her loud and clear, her million voices speaking in tandem.

 

_ No, you don’t. _

 

“Can’t you tell me?” he murmurs. His voice pales in comparison to her’s, quiet and forgotten. Quiet and useless.

 

_ I already have. _

 

…

 

“What do you want to be, Kenma?” Kuroo asks him the same question every morning, when Kenma is half asleep in his microwavable waffles from an all nighter. 

 

Since most of his friends were a year older, he had known how much sleep college would cause him to lose. He thought he could handle it from his years of shounen ai two AM marathons, but he’s discovered there’s a slight difference between binge watching  _ Sekaiichi Hatsukoi _ and staying up all night to turn in his coding homework.

 

It’s also significantly less attractive, but that’s whatever. 

 

“You already know,” he always replies, sleepily.

 

“Then where do you want to go?”

 

Kenma perks up, dropping his fork into a puddle of syrup. This is new, Kuroo’s never asked this before. And Kuroo’s looking less like Kuroo with every word he says, hair growing longer and pen straight with every syllable. He even sits up straighter, even though there’s never been a time he hasn’t complained about Kenma’s stiff kitchen chairs.

 

“Where do you want to be?” His voice is jumbled, cluttered.

 

_ Do you know where you are, Kozume-kun? _

 

He convulses, back coming up off the grass. He can feel it withering beneath him, forming a perfect circle of brown to swallow him up. 

 

She’s at his feet, emotionless. She asks again,  _ Do you know where you are? _

 

“Hell.” The word makes him shiver. 

 

_ If that’s what you believe. _

 

…

 

_ “Kenma…” _

 

He’s all alone.

 

...

 

The world around him burns purple, but the lavender flames do not hurt him. The fire started as soon as the woman disappeared, started where her feet had once touched the ground.

 

It looks nothing like the afterlife he grew up hearing about on his mother’s American television dramas.

 

It’s a projection, fake, satirical. 

 

_ Disgusting. _

 

…

 

_ Do you know where you are? _

 

_ Do you know where you are? _

 

_ Doyouknowdoyouknow -  _

 

_ Doyouknowwhereyouare? _

 

…

 

He’s climbing up a mountain, walking towards the base. The peaks are miles below him, but, he has yet to reach the top. He clears the snow, enters the tree line. 

 

Feathers surround him, like a burial ground for birds, a burial shroud for the mountains. 

 

He continues to climb up, to the top, to the base.

 

…

 

_ Do you know where you are? _

 

“Do you?”

 

…

 

_ “Kenma - “ _

 

He wakes up to Kiyoko, fire dancing at the hem of her dress, lighting up her eyes. She frowns, disappears, and fire consumes the land.

 

And for once, the smoke fills Kenma’s lungs. He’s choking - can’t breathe - can’t see - he’s lost his head - everything is  _ gone -  _

 

He doesn’t die.

 

…

 

He’s dead, he realizes. Probably cremated, sitting on a shelf in his parents’ house, surrounded by childhood photos and momentos.

 

_ Death isn’t the end, Kozume Kenma. _

 

He wishes he could come back as a vampire, with luminous eyes and bloody teeth. He wishes his mind would shut up.

 

…

 

_ Where are you?  _

 

“Not where I belong.”

 

…

 

No light - just a single pinprick, a small portion of the moon not covered up and hidden by clouds. It’s not bright enough to see anything, but there’s nothing to see here, anyway. 

 

Between him and the moon - the woman, floating. Suspended, like spun sugar. She glows, casts more light than the moon. It means nothing. 

 

Kenma wants to move, close his eyes. It won’t work - the scene is searing into his retinas. It’s a tattoo on the backs of his eyelids. It burns, biting like a cocktail of acid and bleach. He wishes the light would go out.

 

He wishes this world would end.

 

…

 

_ “Kenma…” _

 

There’s no one there.

 

…

 

“Why am I here?” 

 

_ Why would you not be? _

 

“Then why did I die?”

 

_ Why would you not? You are human, after all. All humans die eventually.  _

 

“Was it because of Kuroo?”

 

_ Why would it be because of him?  _

 

“The person who came - the one who killed me - he had wings. Like Kuroo’s, but they were covered in metal. He was like an angel out of a video game. The kind who kill and maim.”

 

_ And was Kuroo ever like that? _

 

“No. Never.”

 

_ Then you have your answer. _

 

“You - you didn’t explain anything.”

 

_ I don’t need to. Kuroo did not follow the rules. Kuroo did not follow orders. Why have a soldier who doesn’t follow orders, all because he found a human to serve instead? Why continue to have a problem when it is easy to root out and destroy? What is one human life worth when there are billions to replace it? What are you really worth, Kozume Kenma, to anyone other than Kuroo? Who will mourn for you, other than Kuroo? _

 

“No one.”

 

_ And so, you have your answer. _

 

…

 

There are hands on his hips  - collapsed at the palms, biting like nails at the fingertips. They trace over bones, igniting flesh everywhere they touch. Kenma leans into the touch. He doesn’t open his eyes, can’t ruin whatever this is, whatever it’s  _ not. _

 

_ “Open your eyes, Kitten.” _

 

He shakes his head. He can’t lose this, won’t lose this, can’t let go, won’t let go.

 

_ “Come on, Kitten. You know I’ll never leave you.” _

 

_ But you did, _ he wants to say. He remains silent, breathing in the touch.

 

_ “Kenma.” _

 

He opens his eyes, sees a flash of unruly black hair and brown eyes.

 

And it’s gone, and he’s surrounded by fire, yellow flames brushing against maroon clouds.

 

…

 

_ Did you know, even angels can die? _

 

“Why are you telling me this?”

 

_ Did you know, once you are dead, categories mean nothing? Do you know what that means? _

 

“What are you saying?”

 

_ We will all go to the same place, in the end. We all will meet in the eternal void of death. _

 

_ So, do we every really lose each other? _

 

…

 

_ “Kenma…” _

 

He’s reaching out - grasping air. He’s so  _ close -  _

 

_ “I’m coming home, Kitten. Are you ready? Will you wait for me?” _

 

…

 

_ Goodbye, Kozume Kenma. _

 

“Where are you going?”

 

_ I’m not going anywhere. We say goodbye to those who leave us, do we not? _

 

…

 

The air around him is warm, but not stifling. Something his tickling his arms, his torso, his neck, his jaw. He tries to move away, only to be pulled closer, his face pressed against a solid chest. 

 

The feathers wrap around him even more tightly, but it doesn’t feel constricting - just warm, just safe. They brush against his skin, quiver as he tries to shift out of their grasp.

 

_ We will all go to the same place, in the end. _

 

“Is this the end?” Kenma asks quietly, barely loud enough to be heard. But that’s the thing about Kuroo - he’s always listened to Kenma, and Kenma never had to be loud for him.

 

“No,” Kuroo replies, rubbing his cheek against Kenma’s head. “It’s only the beginning.”

**Author's Note:**

> SERAPHIM IS DONE GOD BLESS I'M FREE but really if you're still here, thank you so much  
> but I'm posting a yakulev fic with soulmate tattoos and maybe slow burn either tonight or tomorrow, so if you're interested, stay on the look out for that
> 
> comments and kudos are always loved. requests are welcomed at mother-iwa-chan on tumblr


End file.
